Judge, Bellinger unan­i­mous picks for top rookies

The ver­dict was a unan­i­mous one as New York Yan­kees slug­ger Aaron Judge was named the 2017 Amer­i­can League Rookie of the Year on Mon­day.

Mean­while, Los An­ge­les Dodgers first base­man Cody Bellinger was named the unan­i­mous win­ner of the Na­tional League Rookie of the Year award, beat­ing fi­nal­ists Josh Bell of the Pitts­burgh Pi­rates and Paul De­Jong of the St. Louis Car­di­nals.

Af­ter win­ning a spring train­ing com­pe­ti­tion with Aaron Hicks to earn the start­ing spot in right field, the 25-year-old Judge found him­self at the top of the AL in homers with a rookie record 52. runs (128), walks (127) and, un­for­tu­nately for him, strike­outs (208). His 114 RBIs were sec­ond best in the AL.

The 6-foot-7 Judge is also a fi­nal­ist for the AL MVP award, which will be an­nounced on Thurs­day night.

Bellinger win­ning the NL award gives the Dodgers a record 18th Rookie of the Year win­ner. Bellinger is also the sec­ond straight Dodgers player to win Rookie of the Year. Short­stop Corey Sea­ger did so last year.

The 21-year-old Bellinger broke the NL rookie record for home runs with 39 and fin­ished sec­ond in the league be­hind only Gian­carlo Stan­ton in homers. Bellinger led the Dodgers in RBIs (97) and runs (87).

This is the first time both Rookie of the Year award win­ners were unan­i­mous since 1997, when No­mar Gar­ci­a­parra of BosUPO BOE 4DPUU 3PMFO PG 1IJMBEFMQIJB XPO